The deaths Monday in the southwestern province of Guizhou focused attention on the welfare of children in one of China’s poorest regions.

Three months ago, five runaway boys in the same province died inside a garbage bin, where they lit a fire to stay warm on a cold, damp night in the city of Bijie. Media reports said those boys were largely unsupervised because their parents had sought work in more prosperous parts of the country, and the incident prompted nationwide soul-searching on China’s wealth gap and the effects of its economic boom on families in rural areas.

State-run China Central Television said the government gave each of the five families 22,000 yuan ($3,500) and 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of rice as consolation.